1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method of and a system for recording dictated material such as speech on a recording medium and for subsequently transcribing the dictated material from the recording medium and more particularly, to a method of and system for recording dictated material simultaneously or alternately with indexing signals on a recording medium and for subsequently using the indexing signals to provide indexing information for use in the transcribing of the dictated material from the recording medium.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
Dictation-transcription systems are known in a variety of types. Included among the variety of types of dictation-transcription systems is a system which uses a recording medium having a discrete length and in which the recording medium is generally transferred from a dictation unit to a transcription unit after the dictation of the dictated material and before the transcribing of the dictated material. Also included among the variety of types of dictation-transcription systems is a system which uses an endless recording medium and in which a portion of the recording medium is placed in one tape bin after the dictating of dictated material and before the transcribing of the dictated material and is placed into another tape bin after the transcribing of the dictated material and before the recording of additional dictating material.
With respect to the first of these types of dictation-transcription systems, there have been many prior art attempts to provide indexing information which shows the locations on the recording medium of the beginnings of units of dictated material such as letters and of special instructions included in the dictated material. Some of these prior art attempts have resulted in indexing information being presented simply as a printed index strip on which notations with a pencil or the like are made during the course of dictating. Others of these prior art attempts have resulted in indexing information being provided by an index strip on which marks are automatically made in response to the operation of a switch or the like.
In almost all of these prior art attempts to provide indexing information, the indexing information has been provided during the dictating of the dictated material. As a result, it has been necessary to use considerable care to keep the indexing information relating to the dictated material on a particular recording medium associated with that recording medium since if the indexing information is lost or exchanged with the indexing information relating to the dictated material on another recording medium, the indexing information is substantially useless.
Moreover, in most of these prior art attempts to provide indexing information, the indexing information has been difficult or substantially impossible to duplicate once it has been provided during the dictating of the dictated material. Thus, indexing information which is lost or exchanged as described above has been difficult or impossible to duplicate. Furthermore, in addition to these problems, many of these prior art attempts to provide indexing information have resulted in the indexing information being in a form which makes it difficult to correlate with the dictated material during the transcribing of the dictated material.
With respect to the second of the two types of dictation-transcription systems described above, prior art attempts to provide indexing information have generally resulted in indexing information which indicates little more than the total amount of dictation on a recording medium. Thus, with this type of dictation-transcription system, it has generally been impossible during the transcribing of the dictated material to accurately and conveniently locate instructions included within the dictated material or the beginnings of units of dictated material. This lack of indexing information is particularly serious with this type of dictation-transcription system since this type of system lends itself to the dictating of dictated material which is of substantial length and which includes many units of dictated material.